regulate commerce extends to the land, as well as to the water, that it includes intercourse and navigation, and vessels, as vehicles of commerce, that it includes an embargo which is prohibitory, that this power is 'EXCLUSIVELY vested in Congress,' and 'no part of it can be exercised by a State.' Now, the question, whether the notes of a State bank, issued on the authority of a State, and designed to circulate as money, conflicts with this clause of the Constitution, has never been decided by the Supreme Court of the United States. This is a new and momentous question, never yet adjudicated by the Supreme Court; but how they would now decide that point, with the light thrown upon it by this rebellion, I cannot doubt.

The Government also has the sole power to lay and collect duties, which 'shall be uniform throughout the United States,' and the States are prohibited from exercising this authority. But this power also is in fact controlled by the banks, and the revenue from imports increased or diminished, according to their action. Indeed, they can modify or repeal tariffs at their pleasure, for, they have only to inflate the circulation, and prices rise here to the extent of the duties, and the tariff becomes inoperative. Of all the branches of our industry, the manufacturing is injured most by a redundant currency, limiting our fabrics to a partial supply at home, and driving them from the foreign market. Give us a sound, stable, uniform currency, sufficient but not redundant, and our skilled, educated, and intelligent labor will, in time, defy all competition. But the banks, as now conducted, are the great enemies of American industry.

The Government has also the sole power 'to coin money, regulate the value thereof,' etc. But the banks now regulate its value by controlling prices, by substituting their money for coin, and by expelling it from the country at their pleasure. Recollect, these powers over commerce and money are exclusive, not concurrent, so adjudicated, and the Constitution, in delegating them exclusively to the Government, withheld them altogether from the States. The conceded fact that these powers are exclusive, proves that the States cannot, by any instrumentality, directly or indirectly, control their exercise. An exclusive authority necessarily forbids any control or interference. But there are express prohibitions in the Constitution as well as grants. That instrument declares that 'no State shall emit bills of credit.' The State itself cannot emit circulating paper: how then can it authorize this to be done by a State corporation, which is the mere creature of a State law? The State cannot authorize its Governor to issue such paper: how then can it direct a cashier, deriving all his power only from a State law, to do the same thing? Qui facit per alium, facit per se, and this fundamental maxim of law and reason is violated when a State does through any instrumentality, created by it, what the State cannot do itself.

It is true that a majority of the Supreme Court of the United States, in 11 Peters 257, did decide that the Bank of the Commonwealth of Kentucky did not violate that clause of the Constitution forbidding States to 'emit bills of credit,' but Justice Story, in his dissenting opinion, said: 'When this cause was formerly argued before this court, a majority of the judges who then heard it were decidedly of opinion that the act of Kentucky establishing this bank was unconstitutional and void, as amounting to an authority to emit bills of credit, for and on behalf of the State, within the prohibition of the Constitution of the United States. In principle, it was thought to be decided by the case of Craig v. the State of Missouri (4 Peters 410). Among that majority was the late Chief Justice Marshall.' This decision, then, in the case of the Bank of Kentucky, is overthrown, as an authority, by the fact that it was against the decision of the Supreme Court in a former case, and against the opinion of a majority of the court in that very case before the death of Chief Justice Marshall. In delivering the opinion of the court in the Missouri case (4 Peters 410), Chief Justice Marshall defined what is that bill of credit which a State cannot emit. He says: 'If the prohibition means anything, if the words are not empty sounds, it must comprehend the emission of any paper medium by a State Government, for the purpose of common circulation.' And he also says: 'Bills of credit signify a paper medium, intended to circulate between individuals, and between Government and individuals, for the ordinary purposes of society.' That the notes of the Bank of Kentucky came within this definition and decision, is clearly stated by Justice Story. In that case also it was expressly decided, that if the issues be unconstitutional, the notes given for the loan of them ARE VOID. It is said, however, that the bills are issued by a bank, not by the State; but the bank is created by the State, and authorized by the State to issue these notes, to circulate as money. In the language of Chief Justice Marshall, in this case, 'And can this make any real difference? Is the proposition to be maintained that the Constitution meant to prohibit names and not things?' On this subject, Justice Story says: 'That a State may rightfully evade the prohibitions of the Constitution by acting through the instrumentality of agents in the evasion, instead of acting in its own direct name, is a doctrine to which I can never subscribe,' etc. I am conscious that Justice Story also said in the same case, arguendo: 'the States may create banks as well as other corporations, upon private capital; and, SO FAR AS THIS PROHIBITION IS CONCERNED, may rightfully authorize them to issue bank bills or notes as currency, subject always to the control of Congress, whose powers extend to the entire regulation of the currency of the country.' It will be observed, that Justice Story gives no opinion as to whether the issues of such banks are constitutional, whether they conflict or not with the power of Congress to regulate coin or commerce. He only says (and the limitation is most significant), they do not violate the prohibition as to bills of credit (from which I dissent); but he does declare that to Congress belongs 'the entire regulation of the currency.' Now this power must rest on the authority of Congress to regulate coin and commerce. But these powers, we have seen, were not concurrent, but exclusive; and, in the language of Chief Justice Marshall, in delivering the unanimous opinion of the Supreme Court in the case before quoted from 4 Wheaton 193, as to any such power that 'should be exercised exclusively by Congress, the subject is as completely taken from the State Legislature as if they had been forbidden to act on it.' All then who agree that Congress has 'the entire regulation of the currency,' must admit that all banks of issue incorporated by States are unconstitutional, not because such issues are bills of credit, but because they violate the exclusive authority of Congress to regulate commerce, coin, and its value. I repeat, that while this question has never been adjudicated by the Supreme Court, yet, if their decision in fourth and ninth Wheaton is maintained, such bank issues are clearly unconstitutional. It is clear, also, whatever may be the case of bank issues, based only 'upon private capital,' or, in the language of Judge Story, 'if the corporate stock, and that only by the charter, is made liable for the debts of the bank,' yet, if the bank issues are based on the 'funds' or 'credit' of the State, such issues do violate the prohibition against bills of credit. Such